Let me also say I am a huge supporter of the "no microphones" policy. I firmly believe in using pre-recorded material always for clarity (and so audiences can actually HEAR any spoken dialog), and having a good (preferably stage-experienced) sound engineer who feeds in and works on the lineup (and notes all the sound cues ,such as "MC reads intro, then cue recording", "cue immediately & MC will read description after", wait for char to get to center stage & cue", "music fade-out is already programmed into Entry #8's recording" etc.) BEFORE the Masquerade takes place.